


Lotus

by ExpatGirl



Series: Episode Codas: Hieroglyphs [4]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Implied Castiel/Dean Winchester, M/M, Post-Episode: s11e10 The Devil in the Details, misuse of ancient egyptian magic, strategist!cas
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-11
Updated: 2016-02-11
Packaged: 2018-05-19 17:20:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,851
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5975275
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ExpatGirl/pseuds/ExpatGirl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>The end, when it came, started with a text message.</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	Lotus

**Author's Note:**

  * For [BurningTea](https://archiveofourown.org/users/BurningTea/gifts).



> BurningTea wanted Cas using his knowledge of ancient Egypt to be a badass strategist, and Dean being called out for a few things. I kinda lowkey did the second one. I meant this to be the last coda but it kind of got away from me, so I'll have to focus more on the next one which will--oh, please!--be the last. I'm tired of having feelings about this damn episode.

The end, when it came, started with a text message. Dean reached across the seat at the sound of the notification and saw the name CASTIEL appear, unassuming in all caps. He pulled the car over to the side of the road with less care than he might normally have done, but his entire body suddenly felt on fire. Dean hadn’t had a text or phone call from him since before Cas’ recon mission to find out if Amara had been killed. That had been four weeks, three days and seven hours, according to his message folder. There were several days’ worth of outgoing texts after that date. Nothing earth-shattering, of course— _Think I’m over the smiting sickness, FYI, so don’t worry_ ; _Are you heading this way soon_ ; _Did you forget to buy more minutes? Me and Sam got a family plan for the non burners. I can add you if you want—_ but his stomach clenched at the thought of Lucifer seeing them, and the hundreds of preceeding messages, at all.

For about half a second, he nursed the small, mad hope that the text actually _was_ from Cas, that he’d somehow managed to kick Satan to the curb and regain control of his vessel, but the hope died immediately as he read.

 _My brother has a message for you, after all_ , it said, followed by a long string of numbers with letters at the tail. _He also says that male gray whales engage in orgies with each other. I don’t know if that’s relevant._

A second message popped up. _I will have the final Seal within two days pending the successful slaughter of an Italian convent. Be ready to go at my signal._ Then a third: _This is much more convenient than demon blood._

Dean tapped out a reply and cursed at the mistakes his shaking hands caused. _Text when it’s go time. DO NOT TEXT OR CALL FOR ANYTHING ELSE. Me or Sam_.

After a moment, the screen went black. He unclenched his fingers. Then the notification trilled again. _Like a horror movie_ , Dean thought as he looked at the new message.

_Good talking to you Dean. I look forward to ripping your heart out. Speak soon._

****

The next text was from Claire. _Is Castiel OK? He totally ghosted on me for weeks, and now he’s being all weird in his texts._

“Shit,” Dean said, standing up from the table where he and Sam had been laboring over Cas’ cryptic alphanumeric clue. He fumbled with the phone for a minute before it began ringing. Out of habit, he put the call on speaker when she answered. “Claire,” he said, without preamble. “Do _not_ text or call Cas’ number, okay? In fact, I want you to block it right now.” 

"Why? Did some creep get his phone?”

“Uh,” Dean said, looking desperately to Sam for guidance.

“That’s...not Cas contacting you, Claire,” Sam said carefully, after a moment. “I’m going to send you and Jody a couple of photos of some sigils. I want you to put them up around the house. And uh...listen, once you’ve got the sigils up, try and stay inside for the next...two days or so, okay? We’ll call you as soon as it’s safe again.”

Claire said nothing, but her breathing on the other end of the line became labored. “Is he dead?”

“No,” Dean said, pinching the bridge of his nose to try and keep the headache that was forever threatening him at bay. “No, he’s alive, Claire.” That, at least, wasn’t a lie.

“Something has him,” she said flatly. “Not his phone. _Him_.”

“We’re gonna get him back, Claire. Soon.”

“Claire, I’ve sent you the sigils, okay?” Sam cut in.

There was another tortuous silence. They heard Claire’s throat catch, as though she were crying and trying not to. But her voice was calm when she spoke again. “Those are angel sigils. Warding.”

“How’d you know?” Sam asked, equal parts startled and impressed.

“What do you mean _how do I know_? Ex-vessel, remember? You’re not the only one that does research.” She took a deep breath. “Did they kidnap him? They didn’t drag him back up to Heaven, did they? He...he hated that, you know. It terrified him. I could feel where they...” Dean could practically see her shudder. “Never mind.”

Dean and Sam looked at each other. Sam’s eyes said _we have to tell her the truth, Dean_ , but Dean didn’t know if he had it in him to listen to a young girl’s heart break over the phone.

Turned out, they didn’t get to make that choice, because they were quiet a little too long. “Not taken,” Claire said softly, before either of them could come up with a response. “Not killed. Not...oh no, not...possessed?” There was a quiet noise that was probably a sob, as though Claire was holding the phone away from her face.Then she cleared her throat, and once again, her voice was steady when she spoke. “How...how is that even possible? Wait, let me get my copy of _The Enochian Myth_.” They heard the sound of frantic rummaging, and of several thuds, as though things were falling off whatever surface she was near. After a few moments, she said: “Dean, Castiel is a _seraph_. No way a regular angel could possess him. I mean, not even another seraph should be able to do that, unless he was seriously weakened. Jesus Christ, I told you to _keep an eye on him_. What the hell happened?”

Dean lost the war of attrition with his headache and sat down heavily next to Sam.

“Claire,” Sam said softly. “It’s a long story, okay? But just try and understand, what happened...Cas did what he did because he thought it was the right thing to do.”

 _We both know that’s not the only reason_ , Dean thought, looking at Sam. Sam looked away.

“Yeah, so did my dad, and look how well that turned out for him.”

“Claire…” Dean began.

“Save it, Dean. You do whatever you need to do to get him back. I have some sigils to paint and golf team tryouts to miss.”

She hung up.

****

“Dean, it’s coordinates.”

It had been ten hours since Castiel’s message, and they had about forty more, on the outside, to decipher it. If, in fact, it meant anything at all. Sam had consumed an entire pot of coffee and three pastrami sandwiches in that time. His stomach was beginning to remind him of his age, and of the fact that he needed water and maybe a vegetable sometime soon.

Dean blinked awake from where he’d been dozing, with his head on his arms, at the table. His neck creaked in complaint. “Coordinates? To where?”

“To, uh...here.”

“What?”

“They’re for the bunker.”

“Why the hell would he give us coordinates for our own home?” Dean looked again at the string of numbers. _But also…_ “And since when do coordinates have letters at the end?”

“I don’t know,” Sam said, frustrated. He pushed his hair away from his eyes and tipped his head back. “But they’re definitely the coordinates to this place.”

****

“Sam.”

Sam jolted from his fitful nap. “Huh?”

“The letters. They’re for the filing system.”

“What?” Sam asked, peeling the sheet of paper off of his face and looking again at what was written there. “Wait. Oh my god, I think you’re right.” He looked at Dean blearily, taking in his bathrobe and still-damp hair.

“I know I’m right. I do some of my best thinking in the shower,” Dean said.

“Yeah, I bet.” Sam frowned, mentally running through the cataloguing system the Men of Letters used. “Spells,” he said, after a few seconds. “The Levant. Mesopotamian or Egyptian, I think.”

“I bet that works wonders on the ladies, Poindexter,” Dean said, but his smile—the first in weeks—was affectionate. “Well, only one way to find out. Let’s go.”

****

“According to the translation, it’s a binding spell.”

“Binding? For what? The Darkness?”

“No, ancient Egyptians thought of the primordial void as a neutral entity. They had no interest in binding it.”

“Shows how much they knew.” Dean sighed. “So it’s a bust.”

“Maybe not.” Sam frowned at the yellowed paper, thin as onion skin, and smoothed it out gently. He’d even found some gloves, to keep from damaging it further.

(”I’m gonna have to scan all these so we don’t lose them forever,” Sam had said earlier.

“Well, Cas can help you with that if you show him how to use the scanner.”

“Yeah.”) “

“This is...it says it’s ‘The Downfall of Apep’.”

“A-who?” Dean asked, leaning in close to look at the carefully rendered and shaded hieroglyphs.

“Apep.” Sam pointed, and Dean saw the sinister bend of a huge snake along the bottom of the page. “The, uh, giant serpent, enemy Ra, scourge of Heaven, bent on destroying the world. Huh.”

“A serpent who wants to destroy the world. That sounds kinda familiar.”

“Yeah.” Sam looked thoughtful. “There are a lot of different myths about him. This one is from Abydos. But the notes on the back say the spell itself is pre-dynastic. _Seriously_ old. According to this one, Ra called on Seth to bind Apep and cast him into...um...into a pit.”

“...Right. And this is the spell he used to do it?”

“Cas seems to think so.”

“Good enough for me. How do we light this candle?”

“We’re gonna need…” Sam paused, looking over the list of instructions. “We’re gonna need some heavy duty stuff, Dean.”

Dean gestured around them. “We’ve got some heavy duty stuff right here. You wanna be more specific?”

“Some of it we’ve got here, sure. But some of it...Dean, we need Rowena. Or Crowley.”

“Shit.” Dean said. He groaned. “It’s been radio silence from both of them for weeks, but sure. We’ve got about a day and a half to find them, get our materials and ice the devil. No sweat. Awesome.” He pulled his robe tighter around himself. “Plus, dude, that doesn’t tell us anything about how to get that dick out of Cas.” He paused. “Uh. Bad phrasing.”

“Yeah, no, I get you.” Sam said vaguely. He looked back down at the paper, and Dean immediately disliked the cast of his mouth. “That’s not what this is for. There’s no...expulsion of any kind. I don’t think Cas is thinking of...he’s thinking of winning, Dean, not saving himself.”

“Oh, now there’s a big surprise.”

“Dean. What if...what if this is it? We’re at the one yard line here. I mean…”

“No, Sam.”

“Dean, listen to me. _I want to save Cas_. We’ve spent the last four weeks turning this place upside down for _anything_ that will help. Hell, I’ve tried summoning angels, demons, demigods, you name it.”

“What, when?” Dean asked, suddenly rattled.

“Usually when you’ve been asleep or on supply runs.”

“Sam…”

“I didn’t tell you because nothing’s worked. The same reason you didn’t tell me about the fact that you were considering _necromancy_. Yes, Dean, I found your notes. No one will help us. The angels won’t answer my calls and the demons are too freaked to even come within a hundred feet of me. And none of them have any info on Crowley _or_ Rowena.” Sam pushed the hair out of his face with an irritated scowl. “So, I’m just saying...what if this is it? I’m out of ideas. _What do we do_?”

Dean gripped the edge of the table so hard that he almost expected the wood to buckle under the pressure of it. But he didn’t have that kind of strength, not any more. He took a deep breath and let go. “What we do is find Rowena. You and her are on that whole...Psychic Friends Network thing.”

“Dean, she hasn’t come back since that first dream.”

“So you go to her! You, I dunno, you _pray_ to her. You tell her we’re basically T minus zero on the showdown, and if she wants to get her revenge on Lucifer, _now_ is the time to do it. If she’s as pissed as you say she is, she’ll come.”

“Right,” Sam said, with the set to his jaw that meant he’d decided, it was happening, consider it done. “Okay. I’ll go to her.”

****

“I’m not a demon, you pillock, that’s why I haven’t answered your summons.”

Sam was back in the hotel room he remembered from his dream. This time, though, the walls and carpet weren’t oozing with blood, which was a nice change. Rowena sat in the overstuffed chair in front of the fire, drinking tea, as she usually did. Everything seemed so uncannily normal that, were it not for the grotesque twist in her neck, he could almost believe they were in any upscale hotel suite. Her voice had regained its usual composure, too, and lost the strange harmonics that caused it to fray at the edges like a chorus of shrapnel. In fact, it almost sounded...fond.

“They didn’t put you on the rack?” Sam asked, horrified and intrigued in equal measure.

Rowena rolled her eyes. “They _tried_.” She took a sip of tea. “Without success, in case that wasn’t obvious.”

“Oh...okay,” Sam said, swallowing nervously.

She smiled at him. “Oh, don’t fret yourself. I have no interest in a coup d’etat. At least not the traditional kind. I’ll leave the running of Hell to my son, once he’s out of his little oubliette. He has a much better head for the tedious paperwork than I do. He can still play King to his little black heart’s content.”

“What’s in it for you?”

Rowena’s mouth made a thoughtful little pout. “Adoration. A virtually unlimited supply of demon servants. Power in Hell over those who have wronged me. And none of the pesky _minutiae_. You must remember: I’m not in here with them. They are in here with me. I can fashion my version of Hell to my liking. Why would I abdicate the throne that I made? Why would I _bother_ with earth, Sam?” She set down her cup. It had thistles painted in delicate purple, below a gold rim.

“If you’re so powerful, why don’t you fix the, uh…” He gestured hesitantly towards her neck.

Her eyebrow arched. “I’ll have my revenge, Sam, and I can’t let any niceties distract me. Not yet. So this is...motivation.” She waved her hand, and her teacup refilled itself, sending delicate curls of steam towards the ornately carved ceiling. “Now, you said you had a time and place for your final meeting with Lucifer. Tell me.”

Sam put up a hand. “Wait. We have one condition.”

She set her teacup down. “What on earth could you possibly have to bargain with?”

“Your son.”

She rolled her eyes again. “Please.”

“Hey, you said it yourself: he’s the one with the head for boring paperwork. I should have ganked him a long time ago but...better the devil you know, I guess, right? If he dies, it’ll create a power vacuum in Hell. I know firsthand what those are like and believe me, you’d find it pretty...inconvenient.” He smiled, the sharp, stone smile that made monsters shiver. “So, you give us this one thing, you get your revenge and you avoid all that unpleasant unrest.”

“And how long would this bargain last? Forever?”

“Nothing lasts forever, Rowena. But that’s a risk you’ll have to take,” Sam said, still smiling. He saw her blink, for the first time unsure, but then her face resumed its normal untroubled appearance.

She smiled back at him, the same kind of smile that he wore, and Sam wondered what she was thinking. “Alright, my dear. Name your condition. Though I think I might know what it is. Let me guess: wings, halo, heart—all broken? Possessed of a rather fine set of blue eyes and an unfortunate fondness for your brother?”

Sam looked away from her for the first time. “Yes.”

She grinned, and he could not tell if it was malice, or delight, or something else altogether that was behind it. “Oh, I do so love being right.” She stood, and a sheet of paper materialized on the table in front of her. “I’ll save your little pet…”

“He’s not a _pet_.”

Rowena raised her hands in mock surrender. “Alright, I’ll save your...friend.” She wrote out a list with an ostrich quill pen. “I have all the power I need. Here's where to find the ingredients, and the Book and Codex. Get the potion made beforehand. Summon me _properly_ when it’s time. It has to be last minute, Sam. If we lose the element of surprise, we lose everything. Do you understand?”

Sam nodded mutely, committing the list to memory, but she put it into his hands. He looked up at her, and her eyes blazed. “Well, my boy, what are you waiting for? Let’s go beat the devil.”

***

When Sam woke, he had the paper clutched in his hand. It smelled faintly of smoke.

 


End file.
